


Moving On

by Muzu



Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Past Geralt/Yennefer, Past Relationship(s), Temporary Amnesia, game universe, talking it out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-13
Updated: 2020-09-13
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:07:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26437666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Muzu/pseuds/Muzu
Summary: There are so many things left to be done, and yet one of the biggest is a long overdue talk with a certain sorceress about where they stand now.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia & Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Triss Merigold
Comments: 1
Kudos: 12





	Moving On

**Author's Note:**

> Honestly, I consider the Witcher Game Universe and the Witcher Book Universe and the Witcher Show Universe to all be completely different universes where the events/choices made in one didn’t necessarily carry over to the other. 
> 
> As such, having played the Witcher games – I just can’t get myself to feel like Geralt would leave Triss for Yennifer after all the major events that have just transpired have all had Triss at his side while Yennifer was off searching for Ciri. But that’s my opinion. 
> 
> I liked Yennefer, but I can understand how others might not have with her 'take charge/take no prisoners/how dare you question me' attitude. I did think that based off of the game universe and how she interacts with Geralt and how all the NPC's refer to her and her history/relationship with Geralt that they were perhaps not the best mix. But once again, that's my take on it.

The explosion rocks the foundations of Kaer Morhen, and seconds after it flows past him Geralt can hear Yennefer’s angry cursing.

 _“Gods dammit! You piece of shit!”_ Comes around the corner and Geralt takes a deep breath and mentally tries to prepare himself to approach and deal with the angry sorceress.

“Uh-oh.” He mutters to himself in a kind of personal joke before he forces himself up those stairs like a man heading to his own execution. Yennefer is coughing amongst the smoke, looking as soul-crushingly beautiful as she always does even as she cusses out the crystal that’s caused this whole scenario.

“You decide to blow us up?” Geralt asks as he approaches, his tone light even if he’s not entirely joking. Yennefer has been known to cut corners and to not really consider the cost or repercussions of her actions until after the whole thing has played out. It’s something that Geralt has been on the receiving end of far too many times.

“Geralt, I’m in no mood for jests. Especially dull ones.” Yennefer spits out at him, and honestly he can’t help but wonder how many times she’s taken that tone with him for reasons that he had no part in and he’s a little sick of it. It’s a brave new world and a brave new day, and he’s finding that after the release from the Djinn’s curse that he’s less and less interested in being Yennefer’s personal scapegoat.

“Need to blow off steam? Go ahead, just not on me.” Geralt says and he can see how his words have incensed the tiger in the room with him. “Find some other target. I don’t know…throw another bed off the balcony.”

“Ha ha ha. So it’s to be dull jokes after all?” Yennefer’s voice is full of unimpressed distain for the topic that Geralt has just brought up between them.

“Rather have a serious conversation? We can do that, if you prefer.” Geralt says, and he certainly prefers it. He’d rather it all just get out in the open, maybe have a few yelling matches over it and then put it in the past where it belongs with the rest of it all. She gives him a kind of glare. “So upset about Triss, you gotta take it out on the furniture?”

“Would you prefer I take it out some other way?” Yennefer says and she immediately tries to shut down the conversation after her usual bag of threats. “Know what? We should end this discussion – before I say something I’ll regret.”

“But I’d love to hear what you have to say.” Geralt presses, uninterested in letting Yennefer hold all the cards in this conversation. If she’s going to act like a child and destroy other people’s property instead of _talking_ to Geralt, then Geralt’s uninterested in coddling her about it all. Already, Triss is walking around Kaer Morhen like she’s done something wrong and like every corner has Yennefer in it. He’s still rather annoyed that Yennefer seemed to believe that they needed her permission to embrace earlier after their time apart.

“Is that so? Very well then. Listen.” Yennefer says, her shoulders back. “You shagged my friend. For upwards of a year. I cannot know what your witchers’ code says on the matter, but ordinary folk would consider it obscene, base, vile.” She glares at him, wanting some kind of apology or interjection of wrongdoing on Geralt’s part but he remains silent. “I try not to think about it…That stupid bed was making it difficult. That’s that.”

“Yen, told you already. I lost my memory.” It’s exasperated and tired when it comes out and somehow, it’s either the words or the tone that does it, but Yennefer is incensed again.

“And I’ve lost my patience.” She snarls and her magic whips around the area – before he finds himself falling out of midair and into the lake. There’s a moment of amusement on his part, a glimpse of how life was like in the old days when it was him and Yennefer constantly bickering. The amusement fades away though at the chill of the water and the rage and irritation sets in. He’s not the same witcher that Yennefer knew all that time ago. He’s changed, who knows maybe even grown a bit, but he knows that he is not going to take Yennefer’s behavior lying down anymore.

He’s practically spitting fire himself when he storms back up those stairs and sees her there.

“Ah, Geralt. Anything you’d like to say?” She says and it’s clear that she expects him to grovel like he might have once upon a time just to keep her happy, but he’s uninterested in playing that role.

“Mhm. The view from there – spectacular.”

“Perhaps I should’ve teleported you two miles higher? Breathtaking, that view. To _die for_ really.” The threat is clear. It screams ‘back down Geralt. Apologize and grovel Geralt. If you know what’s good for you Geralt’.

“You could have come looking for me.” Geralt finds himself snapping. “The second I remembered you, the _second_ that there were rumors that you were alive, I went looking for you.” Yennefer stares at him with those violet eyes that once captivated him so fully and even to the point of self-destruction. “Why didn’t you come for me?”

“ _I_ was busy.” Yennefer snaps. “Unlike certain people shagging their way across the continent, I had a job to do.”

“I didn’t ‘shag’ across anything.” Geralt throws back. “Be angry about Triss all you want, but don’t pretend that it was something it wasn’t. Don’t pretend that she was just one in a long list of women that I slept with until you graced me with your presence again.”

“For an apology, this is going horribly.”

“It’s not an apology. I’ve got nothing to be sorry for, and you know what? Neither does Triss.”

“Triss knew who you were to me. She knew how import-“ Yennefer cuts herself off and looks away. Some of Geralt’s rage simmers down at it.

“They thought we were both dead. Then I came back and no one knew how. I had no memory of you,” Yennefer makes a huffing sound. “Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Pretend like I’m just making this crap up. You _know_ that I had amnesia. Fuck, all of the world fucking knew it. Don’t pretend like you didn’t hear about it from wherever you were with Emhyr.” Geralt shakes his head. “No, actually fuck that. You had to have heard the rumors and with your own experience with the amnesia, you _know_ I wasn’t lying. You just left me out here. Alone and confused and you just _left me_.”

“Oh? And what of your precious friends? Your sweet Triss? Could they have not told you?”

“Years Yen. _Years_. You would have known that they didn’t.” Geralt retorts. “And you know what? They did tell me things. They told me everything except anything about you, and you know what? I’m not angry about it.”

“Oh?” Yennefer lets out a harsh laugh.

“Yeah, look around Yen, you’ve not made friends here. Every time I turn around, you’re starting something with your…let’s call them _habits_ in how you treat people and everyone here hates it. Looking back, I can see how they all probably breathed a sigh of relief when I didn’t know the first thing about someone named Yennefer of Vengerberg.”

“Is that how you feel about it?” Yennefer snaps. “Good to know.”

“Don’t pretend that I felt that way. I loved you, or at least I think I did.” He says and she cringes at that. “But Yen, you left me out here, in the cold when you could have come to help me. You don’t get to be angry that I moved on after _years_ of not remembering you and then thinking that you were dead.”

“I’m sure Triss was really all broken up about it.”

“Triss is your friend, and you know it. She thought you were dead and when I remembered, she assumed that I would chase after you and she left.” Geralt says. “She was going to bow out, I’m the one who for the first time, had to chase after her.” He gives Yennefer a look. “I love Triss, Yen. I didn’t do it to spite you and neither did she; but I’m not going to tip-toe around my own home or _ask for your permission_ in order to be with her.”

“Good. Good to know. Glad we cleared that up and that we’re on the same page.” Yennefer snaps, but there’s a way that she holds herself when she crosses her arms that looks less aggressive and more self-protective and it makes Geralt back off a bit.

“We didn’t do it to hurt you.” Geralt says gently. “Triss didn’t do it to hurt you. None of us expected for it to turn out this way.”

“Is that supposed to comfort me?”

“I don’t know.” Geralt admits. “Maybe?”

“It didn’t.” She retorts before she sighs. “…is it better?”

“Is what better?” Geralt asks and Yen looks like she regrets everything for a moment before she digs deep in that well of stubbornness that she’s always been known for and continues.

“You and…You and Triss.” She says. “Why…why does it work for you two, but didn’t for us?”

“Honestly, I think we’re just different people in different places in our lives then we were all that time ago.” Geralt says. “I won’t lie, I have good memories of us. Frustrating ones, but good.” He smiles and Yen matches it a little. “But with Triss…I don’t know, it’s just…it’s just different. She’s…warm. I feel like I can be at rest when I’m with her. You and I were always a fight, one argument to the next, Triss…we don’t have that kind of barrier between us.”

“Do you think…if I had come for you, that things would be different?”

“Yeah.” Geralt nods. “I think we would have fallen back into old habits, and I think in the long term that neither of us would have been happy. Not really, and Yen…we deserve to be happy. Maybe we’ve just been too scared to put ourselves out there, or maybe it was the Djinn. Whatever it is, we’re free from it.” He looks her in the eyes. “I hope that we can get to a place where we’re friends…I’d like that.”

“So you want me to just watch your happy ending, with _her_?”

“No, I want you to be my friend. Nothing more, nothing less.” He says and she takes a moment before she lets out a big sigh and waves her hand as if waving him off.

“Fine, fine. We can discuss it later. Right now, we’ve got bigger things to worry about.”

“Alright, what do you need me to do?” Geralt says, stepping forward and he hopes that things smooth out between them. He might not be in love with Yennefer anymore, if he ever was outside of the Djinn ‘wish’ thing, but he does know that he cares for her a great deal and that he would truly like to see her be happy and go on to have everything that she ever wanted out of this life.

He just can’t give her him anymore. That belongs to another sorceress and Geralt has no desire to take it away from her. Someday, they’ll be away from all of this and they’ll be able to settle down and have a calm and peaceful life together. It’s worth it, when all of this is done, Geralt is more than ready for that part of his life to begin.

Him and Triss. Forever.


End file.
